Introduction High altitude air cooling has always been somewhat of a mystery to the uninformed. The first reaction to the situation is that there is just not enough air at altitudes greater than six kilometers (20,000 ft). At times this may be true, but many things can be done to improve the cooling and obtain an acceptable design. The most important thing to remember when … [Read more...]
Archives for September 1998
Convection and radiation heat loss from a printed circuit board
In last issue's column, a method for calculating the thermal conductivity of a printed circuit board (PCB) was described. Now, we look at a more complicated heat transfer process, namely the loss of heat from the surface of a PCB to the ambient air. This situation is more challenging to describe mathematically since it involves the simultaneous processes of heat spreading by … [Read more...]